universal feelings

"breaking up with someone is literally the most common thing... but when it happens to you it feels so specific..."

i listen to podcasts every morning when i wake up. i've got a podcast app on my phone that keeps playlists, which is extremely wonderful when i'm moving about the house trying to get ready or get chores done (though sometimes it gets me in trouble because i want to keep listening rather than hustling!)

this morning as i was lazily going about my morning routine, my podcast playlist cycled through two very pertinent episodes back to back. i was kinda stunned by how much they spoke to my current situation, as if tailor made to my experience. it's been that kind of morning, where i feel the universe is looking out for me and i'm syncing up right where it wants me to be.

the first was TLDR's deeply upsetting interview with one of the execs in charge of OkCupid, following their announcement that they've essentially been secretly experimenting on users and their potential matches. definitely did not help my favorable view of OkC.


that was then immediately followed by this superbly delightful episode of This American Life. between the Phil Collins interview and the Jens Lekman outro, i'm over the moon with how perfect it is.

the best part was that i listened to them right after recording this announcement about my recent break-up, my introspective journey from the last few weeks, and my very exciting job decision.

all this to say, you are never alone. your experience is being shared by others all over the world, over and over again.

love according to Stephen Colbert

i love this so much.


Ask a Grown Man: Stephen Colbert from Rookie on Vimeo.

i especially love the part (~7:38) when Stephen starts trying to define love in terms of what it looks like:

"they want to hear your stories. they care how you feel. they want to make your day better. they want to listen to your problems. they reach out to you.

everybody wants to be loved, to have people pay attention to them. but if someone goes to the effort to call you, reach out to you, write you, to come up to you at a party, come over to talk to you, smile when they see you, ask you your problems, those are good signs they like you... if your happiness is more important than their happiness... one nice definition of love, i think, is that another person's happiness is more important than your own. and an early sign of that is that they want to make your day better."

smitten kitten

this post-breakup life has been one surprise after another. thankfully, things are tending towards the upswing.

let me walk you through the stages of post-breakup grief as i experienced them:

1. denial (refusing to accept what had happened, pretending that twisted relationship was worth saving)
2. bargaining (trying to accept blame for more than i was responsible for, trying to change to make him happy, trying to do more than it was in my power to do and do it for the both of us since he was unwilling to make any effort)
3. denial II (saving mementos, pretending like things would magically return to a better place again)
4. depression (so much crying and wallowing)
5. anger (vile hatred for someone you thought you knew, who promised they would never hurt you, who could treat you like detritus and discard you once he was done with you and you weren't satisfying his purposes any more)
6. anger II (seeing your ex-partner wantonly posting pictures of him going camping with a woman, who you suspect was the one he said "he [is] interested in" when he broke up with you... this hurts because: 1. you always wanted to go camping together and you used to talk about it, 2. he brings up the camping trip he planned and you never went on as a pivotal moment in your relationship, 3. it's been how many fucking DAYS since we broke up?! 4. let's be honest, it hurts the most because it looks like he is just fine and moving on so much quicker than you expected him to and the fact he's posting it on facebook has a smidgen of spitefulness to it.)
7. acceptance (you remove him from your friends list in facebook and put him in "acquaintances", block his news feed posts, and remove facebook entirely from your phone. you stop feeling angry and feel a bit sorry that he is so quickly moving on to another woman... you think for a moment about them getting married and having babies and feel the rage rise in your stomach but let it pass because you realize "better her than me" and that you are lucky you got away from that dick bag. you remove him from your phone, you delete his emails, you take all the pictures out of their frames and save them in a box to burn at a later date.)
8. survival mode (clawing my way out of a funk like my life depended on it (it kinda does). applying to jobs like crazy, going to the gym and getting into fighting shape, learning uke and singing until my heart feels happy again, reaching out to friends to buoy me, branching out and meeting new people, consuming literature, news, movies and music, cooking by myself, cleaning furiously, gradually putting all the pieces of my life back together more whole and complete than before. reclaiming my life for myself.)
9. confidence boosting (i didn't realize until after our relationship ended how unhealthy and destructive it was, for my self-esteem, my sense of purpose in life, my sense of self, and my relationships with other people. now that i have, as my dad would say, "cut that cancer out of my life," all the energy i once spent making sure Ben was happy has turned towards making sure i am actually happy. i'm doing things i love again and not worried about being judged for it. i'm finding space to express myself and be happy and meet people without worrying about how to explain it later to someone else. i'm living my life as me rather than as being defined as "Ben's partner." i'm talking to people again and having conversations i care about, rather than trying to exist in a context and parameters dictated down to me by Ben's circumstances. i am meeting so many good people who were previously hidden from me because i was 1. too afraid/not allowed to talk to them; 2. prevented from meeting them because Ben's and my life never allowed for me to grow and reach out to communities i cared about. post-Ben life has seen a wealth of wonderful people, rekindled friendships that had been starved of attention, new friendships that were allowed to flourish once Ben was no longer a hindrance, and most surprisingly of all, a flurry of new romantic encounters that i never would have had the opportunity to explore while tethered to an extremely jealous and possessive but at the same time noncommittal jerk. now that my confidence is back up and i'm happy and free to do what i want, i have seen the difference it makes in my ability to meet people. hopefully it helps me meet people who i want to be around and maybe eventually, help me find someone to love who deserves everything i have to give and will give equally in return.)
10. adventuring (once i rebuild my confidence, which will likely take a long, long time, i hope to challenge myself to go outside my comfort zone and push myself to pursue the life i want, to live without regrets, to live and love furiously)

i'm at the 9th/10th stage right now, i think. the last few weeks i've been making efforts to forget about ben and whatever residual guilt/responsibility i feel. it had been so hard for me to even talk to a guy when we were dating, out of guilt and fear of ben being upset, that dating post-Ben has been an exceptional mental/emotional challenge. even meeting up with a guy just to talk and share food felt scandalous. 

this past weekend i made huge strides in that i flew out to Madison, WI on a whim to meet a guy i started talking to through the internet! OkCupid of all places! craziness! he and i started talking because we both used to be teachers and he works at the company i am currently considering a job with. we somehow really hit it off and he offered to buy my plane ticket out to Madison. if that wasn't crazy enough, i agreed to do it, which is totally unlike me. we spent the weekend together, getting to know each other. he's totally unlike anyone i've ever dated (younger, athletic, my height (ok, a little taller), clean (like, seriously, his place was spotless!), a former business major, has a cute Midwestern accent, totally charismatic and sweet (he can sing! Justin Timberlake songs! swoon!), and really, really into me). we shared desserts the night i got in after he picked me up from the airport, walked around Madison holding hands (i want to pause here for a moment just to illustrate the crazy levels of Stockholm Syndrome i had going on: even holding hands, months after Ben and i have broken up, felt WRONG. just touching another person's hand still felt like i was doing something shameful. that is the ridiculous degree to which i had programmed it into my head that i was Ben's possession, that i belonged to him, that being with other people was an act of betrayal. thankfully, i got over it, but come on, how insane is that!??), went to the farmer's market to buy food to make later that night, looked at apartments for my move, went to the Olbrich Botanical Gardens and saw the butterflies, made dinner together and watched a movie, had brunch, went mini-golfing (where i beat him in the first half of the course, even hitting a hole-in-one on the obligatory windmill hole), bought pots and soil and repotted his plants for his office, went out for a "fancy" date on State Street and went back to his place to fall asleep and wake up early, he held my hand while he drove me to the airport before going to work. 

it was a crazy weekend on so many levels, but the weirdest thing for me to understand is how... good it felt. to be with someone new, exciting, and excited (by me!) and start over. granted, there were a lot of difficult moments when i felt my scars exposed, when i felt guilty or afraid or uncomfortable or sad. there were times when i asked myself what i was doing, when i questioned my motives and commitment, when i questioned his. but to be able to enter into a new situation with another person and be aware of the good that could be, the bad that was, and embrace the opportunity to experience something new was... liberating. i felt like it finally allowed me to shake off the shackles of that last relationship and enter into life with a mind open to being better to myself.

i don't know what the likelihood of that encounter becoming something more is. we may never see each other again. but we shared a weekend together and we were good and we were kind. that is the weird/magical thing i need to constantly have reaffirmed to me: that total strangers can be extremely good to each other. that's what makes love seem so beautiful to me: it turns two total strangers into best friends and partners for life. i don't know what will happen with my friend in Madison, but the fact that we met randomly through the internet and then managed to spend a whole weekend together and were happy doing so endears me so much to the idea of keeping your heart open to anyone you may meet. i no longer fear being alone or never finding another companion who will make me happy. those people abound if you are open to finding them and if your heart is open and courageous enough to be happy. i held onto Ben longer than i should have because i feared i would never be able to find someone else. i never should have let him put me in cages. 

remission

"you just have to cut out all the bad stuff from your life. [the bad people in your life are] like a cancer. cut it out so the rest of you can thrive."

-my dad, giving me post-breakup advice. 

he is so smart, and so so right.

he advised me to get rid of everything that would remind me of Ben and never look back. focus on looking ahead and getting back to happy. he's right. Ben was a soul-sucking cancer. working my way towards healing and beating this thing. i will be a survivor.

security blanket:home :: ex-boyfriend's t-shirt:love

this series of portraits documents women wearing their ex-lovers' shirts and talking about the experience of love (and love lost). i feel like i'm looking into a mirror on my own experience. it helps to know i'm not alone and i'm not a weirdo for doing this too. so much comfort in the feel of that soft fabric against my cheek, even if there isn't a person behind it any more.

i sleep with my ex-partner's shirt beside my pillow. i nuzzle into it at night when i start to feel sad, when my awareness shakes me awake and reminds me again that i'm alone. for some reason just the smell of him helps me feel better, puts me in a place of calm and comfort, makes me think of being in california with nothing but his old shirt in bed with me. he started it; the first time he went away to Turkey, he hid it under my pillow for me to find later, and i slept in bed every night with it wrapped around me, the sleeves around my waist or draped over my shoulders, and somehow through all of that it never stopped smelling like ben, maybe it smelled even better over time because it smelled like us. even though the shirt i have isn't one he left for me, i keep it close by as a reminder: you weren't dreaming, he loved you once, he lived here with you and now he's gone. you were a we once. you loved each other. this is all that remains.

"It feels like a flag I can’t stop flying. It comforts me in the meantime between the spaces. It’s just a rag I turned into a promise that he would never leave. Some sort of common thread between us. Part of me wants to rip it off. So many what-ifs and could’ve-beens and should’ve-beens and never-weres. It’s just a shirt. It’s been there for me when people haven’t. It makes me feel childish and taken care of. It makes me look a little stronger than I am. As long as I hold onto the shirt she is never completely out of my life. I’d wear it every day if I could. As much as you build a house around it or put a ring on it it’s all still temporary and dissolving so all you can do is love it. Even if it’s painful we need to hold onto something. Proof that we did it. That we went through it. That we learned something. That our hearts were broken. That we were loved. That we weren’t loved enough. For someone I won’t be something that will be so easily shed."

point of contact

i.
you call me for no reason today
    i was in a meeting
check my phone and see yr face

yr message says you're calling to see how i'm doing
   ask me to call you back

my heart sinks
    boils in my stomach
    my throat tightens
    my face scowls
    my body shakes + sweats

not because i'm excited to hear from you
you calling must mean you have something to say
and i don't want to find out what it is



ii.
you don't get to check in on me like you're doing me a favor
like you're such a noble dude
like you're doing a good thing
walking out and hurting me in the deepest possible way
and then call me in a few days as if that will make things better
you don't get to break into my life again whenever you like

you don't get to ask me how i'm doing
pretending like you care again
when yesterday you acted like i'd done the worst possible thing
by falling in love with you

you don't get to check up on me
when you're the reason i am this way
and you're the reason i'm here
and you're the reason i'll never the be same

you don't get to call whenever you like
and disrupt my world
just as i'm learning to live without you

you don't get to feel better by patronizing me
as if all i've needed is to hear from you
FUCK YOU

because you're not helping
and though i still love you
i kinda hope you rot

solstice

it's the longest day of the year
     a horrible day to be alone
          and missing someone

i'm starting this summer
        and the rest of this life
                 without you

there are more minutes than usual to while away
more minutes than usual to think about you
more time than i want to spend fumbling thru and waiting
more moments than a usual day to be reminded
                  i'm without you

i think of what we'd do in our other life
       pack up a picnic, sit and listen to the whispers of the lake
       ride bikes, wind like fingers thru our hair
       lay in the tall grass and feel the comfort of sun our face
fall asleep later and thank each other for a good day
wake up happy to see the sun rise again

when you're happy the extra time is a gift
         you want to stretch those moments out forever
         time is never enough
         (we used to feel this way)
when you're unhappy the longest day is a torture
        a sentence to be painfully waited out
        time is your punishment
        (this is how i feel now)

a poem for the last day of our shared life

I.
feeling like i've been torn apart
  a train running thru my heart
  crushing everything on the tracks
  turning me into pulp

II.
i want to write down every memory before
    i forget
before it's washed away
    before it becomes too gone
                                   too the past
                                      too lost
                                        too never again

these are the last times i will ever think
   about you

III.
so much emptiness around me
   the room divided in half -- yours and mine
    but now you're gone
  half an empty table
     half an empty dresser
             half an empty bed
         a limp and empty pillow case where your head used to lay beside mine

your coats are gone
    your shoes too
     all the little stray hairs cleaned up
           and scattered somewhere else

IV.
i always thought when we left here we'd be leaving together

packing up our stuff for a new adventure

but you leave without me to start your life
   and i remain in this half empty apartment
                 alone
      every corner a memory
         every moment a ghost

i never prepared myself to be abandoned like this
  i don't have bags packed for this trip

V.
the left and leaving feeling
       the reality of loss
           you don't feel the finality until you see the physical emptiness
suddenly surrounding you

VI.
i watch as you pick thru things and
   stuff them in boxes
   what you choose to keep
     and what you leave behind

notes you wrote me, i find them crumpled
   and discarded in the recycling
  like small helpless birds with broken wings
    i pick them up and unfurl them in my palm

my heart sinks when i find those pieces of us thrown away

a picture of me from Occupy, left on the refrigerator --
    you don't want me coming with you

pictures of us in California --
    a fortune cookie message we somehow got twice
        "Your dearest wish will come true"
    you pinned them to the pictures above our desk
you left those behind too

in one of the pictures, we walk towards each other
    thru a maze of sea stones --
    forever frozen in time, never reaching each other before our moment ends
stuck in the amber of time

scraps of napkin with tape on the back
   a poem we wrote together
   where did this emerge from?
   you kept it safe all these years, only to leave it behind now like trash

a book of pictures -- The Story of Us --
  our happiest memories, a gift i made you
  that gets left behind too

the scarf i made you for Christmas one year,
the only thing i've ever knit, you took that
i imagine you wearing it around your face years from now, not even remembering me
     or maybe you discard it in a Goodwill pile when you wear out its fibers at last

a song you'll never hear again

so many nights spent listening to The National, they've become an outside comfort. they always seemed to know the state of our relationship, both good and bad. but i guess that's every band, isn't it? so much written about love, loss and pain.

in the early evenings in Los Angeles, cooking dinner in our loft apartment, bright kitchen lights softly illuminating the bedroom office, we lived in one large room with many corners connected by a staircase. back then, the lyrics that spoke to our situation were:

Stay out super late tonight

Picking apples, making pies

Put a little something in our lemonade

And take it with us

Tiptoe through our shiny city

With our diamond slippers on

Do our gay ballet on ice

Bluebirds on our shoulders

Turn the light out, say goodnight

No thinking for a little while

Let's not try to figure out everything at once

It's hard to keep track of you falling through the sky

We're half awake in a fake empire

and now? i can't stop listening to this song. it's a chorus to the waves of pain and regret i feel throughout the day. it gives shape to the voids and emptiness and soft-voiced anger i have felt since this started sinking in. it's a reminder that things will be different and i'll never get certain things back, even songs are changed.

Don't make me read your mind
It takes me too much time
You're not that much like me
We have different enemies
You should know me better than that

I should leave it alone but you're not right
I should leave it alone but you're not right

Can't you write it on the wall?
There's no room to write it all
Can you turn the TV down?
There's too much crying in the sound
I should know you better than that

I should leave it alone but you're not right
I should live in salt for leaving you behind
Behind

Think about something so much
Start to slide out of touch
Tell yourself it's all you know
Learn to appreciate the void
You should know me better than that

I should live in salt for leaving you behind
Behind
I should live in salt for leaving you behind
Behind
I should live in salt for leaving you behind
Behind

because i was in love

Sharon Van Etten is having her moment, and good for her. i was driving around Syracuse this morning, feeling so sad and lost, and then this song emerged from a long playlist i made in college.

it was like being thrown a parachute. i felt lifted above the gravity of my sadness for a moment.

i wanted to keep singing it and singing it and thus soothe all these heart wounds. apply it generously like a salve.

you can see i'm breaking up a bit over here. there are some words that are harder to say and swallow than others.

it's a jungle out there

things i never, ever, never ever EVER wanted to be doing with my life:

#1 - join an online dating site.

at first i did it for "research" purposes after hearing this Freakonomics podcast, and then out of curiosity after reading this article. i figured if it's good enough for PJ Vogt, surely it could be good enough for me? (and in all honesty, i thought, if guys like PJ Vogt are using OKCupid, maybe that's where i need to be meeting more eligible, PJ Vogt-like men!) honestly though, i'd never even heard of OKCupid until this podcast, and didn't think people were actually using sites like these to, you know, really date. as soon as i created my profile i felt like i had just set myself up to be trolled.

i figure the internet already brings out the worst in people by granting a veil of anonymity and a low-risk of getting caught for shitty actions and a low accountability to "real" people. but then when you add in the potential for "hook-ups," hundreds of thousands of objectifying men, personal questions about sex, relationships, etc. AND a chat/messaging function? you've pretty much designed THE WORST way i can possibly imagine to meet people. for me at the moment, it still remains a social experiment -- how many guys are interested in me because of the pictures i posted and how many are actually impressed by my work experiences, my interests and my hobbies? i've also been interested to see how race factors into my popularity on OKCupid. so far, i'm surprised that it's been far fewer Asian men and many, many African-American men. like, twice the amount from any other race. lots of young'uns too. and then there was this guy:

what am i, or anyone, supposed to do with that??

i also had a guy try to chat me up and get me to hook up with him and when i said i wouldn't, he proceeded to lecture me about moralizing and basically called me a "stuck up b****." the best part was, about a month later, he tried chatting with me again under a different username (but same picture), and when i ignored him he tried again the next week ("third time's the charm?") i guess even in the digital world of human interaction, a lady just can't get a break from the douchey entitled bros.

all of this to say: i'm angry that this is what's happening. i poured my heart into the last seven years and worked so hard to make another person happy because i thought it's what i wanted and because i thought i couldn't imagine living without this other person. it made me happy to give so much of myself to make someone else happy. then i wake up one day and it's like a switch was turned off, and he became a different person. unable to feel anything, unable to understand what he'd meant to me the last seven years, unable to even look me in the eyes and tell me how his heart has changed, explain what has happened. i look at him now and i feel so distraught and angry, at him for changing into this totally different person who can treat me like such shit, and at myself for letting this happen, for making myself vulnerable and not expecting this could happen one day. every day i wake up and grieve for the person i loved who i feel is now lost to time forever. wherever that person went, i will never see him again, and looking at pictures from the past is such a deep wound in my heart ripped open all over again because i don't understand where that person has gone and know that they've also taken that version of myself with them. i will never be the happy smiling woman in those pictures again either. we're both lost, we've destroyed each other. i used to be excited about the rest of my life with another person, and now i dread the rest of my life spent agonizing forever the doomed happiness of the last seven years.